Life Coach Marketing: A Comprehensive Guide For Long-Term Growth

So, you are certified to be a life coach, marketing coach, relationship coach, etc. You have set up your online business accounts. You have gained a little bit of a following. Now, you are ready to start marketing and develop a life coach marketing plan.

Life Coach Marketing Strategies

If you are like I was when I started trying to market myself, you literally just felt your blood pressure spike. 🥵 Remain calm, and keep reading. I am going to break down some of the basics of marketing for you so that you can (hopefully) save yourself some time & money when it comes to your life coach marketing strategy. 💃🏻

Before Diving In: Understanding the Basics

Before you even begin to develop your marketing plan, there are a few things you need to get very clear about your life coach business. They have been broken down into smaller pieces for you to utilize as a checklist, & also to ensure you get a thorough explanation of what each one is.

Define Your Coaching Niche

Your life coaching niche will be the thing you live by within your business. This niche is your target audience, your tribe, your target demographic, etc. Your niche is what you do. It’s who you help.

Who you work with should be in every bio that you have on all social media platforms that you use.

For instance, I am a Higher Self & Identity Coach. When you go to my profiles, my bio says, “I am a WOMAN RISING helping women bridge the gap between where they are, & where they want to be.”

If someone were to like a piece of my content, and consider working with me, they will immediately head to my profile to read my bio & discover if they think I could continue to provide value for the time they are in.

To determine your niche, you will need to:

• Decide who it is you like to help: women, men, teenagers, couples, etc.
• After you decide who you help, decide what you help them do: find inner peace, lose weight, hear their intuition, etc.
• You then need to be clear about how you help them achieve results: bridge the gap, define your narrative, listen to your body, etc.

⭐ ️ Hint: The more specific you are with niching down, the easier things will be for you in the long run. You will eliminate the possibility that someone signs up to work with you that you actually either cannot help, or are not interested in helping because it is not what you do.

Talk To Your Customers

Talk to your potential clients to do some market research, or just get some feedback. You can ask for strangers to participate, or you can think of people you already know that fit your ideal client persona.

For market research, you can either use an actual call via telephone or video conferencing, or you can create a survey using Google Forms, Typeform, or any other form submission.

I personally prefer video conferencing or a phone call as talking with someone where you can hear each other’s voices allows for organic conversation as well as opens the space for thoughts to flow freely. But, I also understand that is not feasible for everyone due to time constraints, time zone differences, or any other wide array of reasons. So, a form submission will work just as well.

You want to make sure you are asking questions that are relevant to your coaching business & your niche. Some examples of questions are:

• Explain what it is that you are wanting to offer & ask them if they would find it useful & why they would find it useful.
• Ask them if there is anything else you should include in your offer.
• Tell them the price of your offer & ask their thoughts about that. You should also ask them if they would be willing to pay that price if it solved a problem they have.

You can ask anything you want to ask that you would find helpful, but do try to limit it to no more than 10 questions. You can always run another survey later that is more specific/ in depth.

For feedback, you don’t have to be so formal about it, but whether having a conversation with a friend, or posting a Question sticker on your Instagram Story, you can just explain your thoughts & receive their feedback.

In both scenarios, the important thing to note is to not be attached to your idea. The purpose is to navigate through to your best offer. Be willing to receive the feedback without judgment, or the urge to jump to the defensive. Accept the feedback for what it is & take what you want & leave the rest behind.

Should You Offer Free Coaching Sessions?

The only time you should offer free coaching sessions is for Beta clients to have some coaching practice, or as a bonus to a high ticket offer you have.

For Beta clients, these should be your ideal clients that you want to practice with, or that you want to offer a free session in order to get a testimonial from them to help build your credibility. Truthfully, you can offer a free session, or give an extremely discounted price for them. Your potential customers can read these testimonials & they can be a huge help when someone is trying to determine whether or not you are the coach for them.

You can also offer free sessions to your actual clients or new clients that choose to sign up for your program. This can be a great selling point to offer as a bonus. “Join my 3 month 1:1 Coaching program & get an additional coaching session for FREE.”

Steps to Market Your Life Coaching Business

Let’s break down the things you need to know and/ or do in order to get a successful life coach marketing strategy in place.

Define your target audience

Your audience is defined by your niche. They consist of your target market, & dream clients. Essentially, after you know who you want to help, and how you want to help them, then you move on to defining your target audience. So, what phase are they in now & where are you trying to help them go?

EX: You are career coaching and your niche is to help women in male dominated professions get noticed by their superiors. You want them to go from feeling like their effort don’t get noticed to getting consistent praise from their superiors so that they will feel like the #GirlBoss they are everyday..

You also help them maximize their productivity at work using your XYZ method so that they will be at the top of the short list when promotion time comes around, and you help them be able to validate themselves so that they do not suffer from burnout.

You have identified their pain points & also told them how you are going to help them overcome those pain points as well as how they will feel.

After you finish reading this article, take some time to reflect on how you have begun to create brand awareness. Are you letting your target audience see you & find you through your messaging? Is it specific enough? Is your niche specific enough? Are you only focusing on pain points, or are you incorporating how they are going to feel/ what they are going to get from working with you? Make sure everything in your social media strategy, specifically, comes back to those dream clients consistently.

Make an appealing program package

Personally, this is my favorite aspect of coaching as I thoroughly enjoy being creative & developing content & providing educational value for my life coaching business and life coaching clients.

I’m going to break this down in a step by step process that is a roadmap for anyone to make use of, it is your product suite.

Step 1: Develop a Freebie Offer

Give your potential customers a taste of your knowledge & what you bring to the table by providing them with something of value that is tangible. Examples include roadmaps, lists, templates, step by step process. This should not be super detailed, but it should provide basic value that will make your ideal coaching clients curious about what else you have to offer them. I have several freebies I cycle through including a mini course, masterclass, & list of affirmations, so it’s certainly fine to have more than one freebie offer as well.

Step 2: Create Your Low Ticket Offer

Your low ticket offer is anything that your new clients can purchase ranging from $0-$100. These should build off your freebie & be a little bit more in-depth. Again, providing valuable information, but also being able to develop relationships through content that will make attracting clients looking to purchase higher ticket items easier for you. Examples of low ticket offers include workbooks, eBooks, & PDFs.

Step 3: Build Your Mid-Ticket Offer

Your mid- ticket offer should continue to build off your freebie, and provide more information about a singular topic, or something you help coach your clients through. These offers should range in cost from $100 to $1000. Examples of mid ticket offers include Messaging Support via voice notes & texting through a messaging app, bootcamps, & discussion groups

Step 4: Construct Your High Ticket Offer

Your high ticket offer is the one you want to put your heart & soul into. It is what all of your other offers have been building up to, and where you want your target clients to come. Your ticket offer is $1000 & up. These are items like an appealing coaching program that are 1:1, group coaching, masterminds, & digital courses.

For context, here is what my product suite looks like:

• Freebie: 30 Self Prioritizing Affirmations, Living Life on Your Own Rules, Terms, & Conditions Masterclass, Meditate Like A Woman Rising Mini Course
• Low Ticket: 10 Days to a Woman Rising Workbook digital download
• Mid- Ticket: Full day of messaging support via WhatsApp or Voxer
• High Ticket: 1:1 Woman Rising Coaching for 3 months/ 12 one hour sessions.

To get more detailed information regarding How To get Coaching Clients, please visit my last blog post.

Attend workshops and industry events

In any profession, it is important to have continuing education. Coaching is no different. That does not necessarily mean that you need to invest money in courses throughout the year. What it does mean is that you should attend as many workshops and industry events as you can.

Not only should you attend the events, but you should sign up to receive newsletters from these events & volunteer to become a speaker at the events as well. Not only will mingling and/ or speaking at these events add to your credibility & prove your expertise, but it will also help to build your professional network. You never know who may end up providing high quality leads now or later.

Differentiate yourself from your competitors

✨The number one way to differentiate yourself from your competitors is to be authentic to who you are✨

🎯 Remember: When people choose to work with you, they are doing so because they like YOU. They like your message, your style, how you present yourself, your method, & how you help your clients get results.

I wasted so much time being more concerned about what I thought it was people wanted to see & hear from coaches instead of using my knowledge & tweaking it to benefit my own style, tone, & message in order to get high quality leads. Don’t make this same mistake.

💖BE YOU!💖 There is only one.

Organize events

Do you have a cause that you are passionate about? Have you collaborated with enough coaches that have a similar audience as yours? Do you like to meet new people, and help impact your community?

Organize an event. Not just any event, but one where your prospective clients would hang out. Having your name attached to an event as the organizer allows you to expand your network & get your name out there. When you take charge of such a big project you prove to other coaches, potential clients, and businesses that you know what you are doing & what you are coaching about.

Organizing events is a great way to give face to face time with future coaching clients, show them you care, and get your name out there as someone who is readying to make big changes in the world to raise the energetic collective. 💃🏻

Which Social Media Platforms Should I Be On?

The answer to this question is completely up to you. Typically the best results for coaches are on Facebook and Instagram, but I have colleagues that have had excellent success using LinkedIn & TikTok as well. YouTube is also another platform you could potentially utilize depending on your niche & your audience.

There are 2 things to consider when it comes to choosing the right platforms for you to be on.

• One: which platform is your target audience hanging out on? If you are working with younger generations, TikTok & Instagram would probably be your best bet. Potentially YouTube as well. If you are working with professionals, Facebook groups & Linked In would serve you better.
• Two: which platforms do you have the most knowledge about & are the most comfortable using? The goal is not to reinvent the wheel, not cramming to learn an entirely new/ different social media platform to attract clients. Play to your strengths here & use your own discretion.

The typical rule of thumb is to start with one or two platforms, become experts on those platforms & gain a following. If you find it necessary later on in your business, you can expand to other platforms.

Use social media to establish a strong presence

Establishing a strong social media presence sounds so broad, so I am going to provide a checklist below to make sure people know who you are & what you offer first:

• Your profile should have your name & what kind of coach you are. An example is that my own profile says: Ashlie Franey l Higher Self & Identity Coach l WOMAN RISING
• Your bio should specifically address who it is that you help i.e, your life coaching services. For example, mine says: helping women bridge the gap between where they are & where they want to be.
• Have links available using something like Linktree that can help prospective clients navigate to other pages like your life coaching website, your podcast, your free coaching tools, your masterclasses, etc.

Making sure you have these items completed first will help your social media presence because your followers, potential followers, past clients, & potential clients know who you are, what you do, & who you help.

Next, leverage your social media to exacerbate your marketing efforts:

• Create content that is easy for people to engage with: Many life coaches fail to use this marketing strategy as much as they should. Often, coaches get caught up in the service aspect, but to start signing & working with clients, you have to have a relationship first. Thus, creating content where followers can ask you questions, or resonate with you on some level will help your coaching business. Use the opportunity to always respond somehow whenever someone comments on a post. Answer their questions, provide feedback, & support them
• Build content that people can learn something from: Your life coaching business is about teaching people new & more effective ways to live a life that they are looking to better for themselves on some level. So, provide content that people can read and think to themselves, “wow, I didn’t know that”, or something they can save for later to start implementing in their day to day lives.
• Construct an idea of what it would be like to work with you as a life coach: Do not be afraid to use real time photos, reels, & lives. You are your coaching business, and when your audience sees you in front of the camera, they are getting a taste of what you are like in a coaching session. Think of these like free coaching calls. They don’t need to be long or super elaborate, but they should be enough for people to feel into your vibe & see what you bring to the table for when they work with you.

Have a clear brand identity

How do you want to embody your coaching business? Your brand identity should reflect the way/lifestyle your clients are going to feel after working with you. Your social media should present a clear representation of that life so that when your audience sees your posts, they want to be like you, have a life like yours, and/or know what you did to get there.

Some tips & tricks:

• Get a branding shoot done: Your photographer should sit down with you in order to get a feel of the vibe you are going for & the two of you can work together to decide what would best represent that concept in photos for you to use on your social media.
• Work with a branding coach: If you are unsure of the route you want to go with your branding, work with a branding coach. They can help you establish everything from your brand colors to what your overall “look” should be. They can usually also assist in the branding shoot if you decide to go that route.
• Stay consistent in your branding: If you are going for a bohemian, nature vibe then having a random photo of you dressed to the 9’s at a fancy gala would be off brand. While the gala may be for a good cause, the photo would not be on brand.
• Your brand should reflect you: The authentic you! If you have to push, or feel outside of your realm with your branding, you will not be able to keep up with it. You will struggle & thus confuse your followers about what exactly you represent.

Advanced Marketing Strategies for Life Coaches

Establishing credibility & authority are not the only marketing ideas to implement. While they are absolutely the starting point, the marketing techniques below will also help you leverage social media to get clients.

Leverage Testimonials and Reviews

Testimonials and reviews will come to you as you work with clients. Their feedback either for your 1:1 coaching sessions, or reviews on digital courses or course programs are detrimental to your life coaching marketing because they help establish social proof.

Your social media profiles will help you with credibility and authority, but social proof is the next element you need as these pieces of the puzzle will inadvertently start referring the right clients.

By using/posting testimonials and reviews in your life coaching marketing, others who have been on the fence about whether or not to invest money in you and your program will begin to reconsider. When they begin to see results, and wonderful things other people have to say about working with you, your reputation will go up. Thus, making you a more desirable coach to work with.

Testimonials and reviews are essential to digital word of mouth.

So, what are the ways you can get testimonials and reviews? Let’s take a look at some ways to help you get them:

• Typically when you are going through your coaching certification, you will have to prove that you had X amount of hours coaching your peers, family members, friends, etc. in order to qualify for certification. Whether you coach them for 1 hour or 5 hours, reach out to them and ask them to give you a short blurb about their experiences working with you. Though actual transformations may not have taken place, anything that made them feel better will work.
• Going back to the marketing ideas involving beta clients is another way to get proof on social media. Post something in Facebook groups, on your social media profiles, or ask around to see if anyone you know would be interested in one or more free sessions so long as they are willing to provide a testimonial. After the sessions or sessions are concluded, send them a link to provide feedback. You can use beta clients for 1:1 coaching, or also to pilot a group program you are thinking of launching
• If you have worked with paid clients, or even when you do work with paid clients, make sure you always send them something where they can also provide testimonials about their time working with you.
• If you offer messaging support within your coaching packages, anytime someone texts you with a breakthrough or win they had, you can post this too!

Your testimonials and reviews can function as a revolving door as you are working with clients.

NOTE: please make sure you have permission, or black out names when posting testimonials, reviews, or messages of any kind.

Grow Your Online Presence

Coaching businesses typically use more than one type of platform to grow their online presence. Especially as their businesses start to grow because that means your coaching business is growing. Thus, you need a new approach, and also a way to generate more clients.

Learning to collaborate with other experts can be a BIG help to you! I will discuss this more in the next section, but marketing for life coaches can be very dependent upon relationship building and collaboration with other professionals in your industry.

Instagram, TikTok, and even Facebook now offer ways for you to get in front of your audience. Literally. We have moved past the day of only posting a very curated, beautiful photo. Your followers want to see you in real time. So, with the video & reel capabilities within these platforms, you can quickly grow your audience twice as fast. Anytime you have a short video clip, edit it, post it, and put it on all three platforms.

Make sure you have done your hashtag research by using one of these free hashtag generators to further expand your reach recommended as some of the top free generators by Buffer:

• Inflact
• Toolzu
• CopyAI

Make sure you develop relationships with others that may not be coaches, but are in a related field so that you can possibly contribute to their blogs by writing guest blog posts that can help you get seen on Pinterest. For instance, I met Brett & developed a relationship with her by completing her 200 Hour Yoga Teacher Training in May of 2022. Life coaching is my area of expertise, so she was able to leverage our relationship by asking me to contribute to this very series regarding life coaching! 🤩

Collaborate and Network

Collaborating can fast track your name and your coaching business as someone who gets results. I was able to get my first few clients this way. 🤗

When you collaborate with others, it gives you the opportunity to stop wasting money trying to advertise, and allows you to get in front of other coaches or industry professional’s audiences. FOR FREE! Usually it is free anyway, since both people are doing the other a favor, it balances out.

Who should you collaborate with?

• other coaches, whether in your niche or not, including business coaches
• other spiritualists/ corporate/ health professionals
• psychologists & therapists
• meditations & mindset professionals
• yoga instructors in specializing in various forms of yoga
• any other business owner

Pretty much anyone that has something they can talk about with you that pertains to & benefits both audiences. Having these conversations with others can help showcase your coaching skills, give you the opportunity to talk about life coaching techniques, talk about your coaching business, and possibly get you a few clients.

Embrace Email Marketing

Aside from gaining a following on social media, building your email list is also important. Getting people to subscribe to your email list allows you the chance to continually get in front of a pre- built audience every time you have an announcement, new program, etc.

The best, and most efficient way is to create a freebie offer that requires your followers to input their email address. These can include things like masterclasses, mini courses, meditations, templates, or any other small item of value that give your audience a small taste of what you coach your clients on.

NOTE: Best practices are to not spam your audience, or sell their email addresses. I have a disclaimer everywhere on my website letting my audience know how much I value their privacy. Also, when trying to build a relationship via email marketing, I would recommend only sending out automated emails once a week or even once a month. Does anyone else get annoyed when you get multiple emails a day from the same person or business?

Bonus Tips for Life Coach Marketing

Below I have included some other creative ways to market your life coaching business that are not quite as common as the methods we have already addressed.

Write a Book

To further prove your expertise, you could always write a book about a topic you coach about. I myself have even written an ebook. Ebooks are more common as you start out as they are less expensive to produce, and easily sent via a link or digital download.

Writing a book is a great way to help people see how knowledgeable you are on a larger scale about the topics you coach about, and contribute to your authority within the coaching world. As you become more known you can eventually publish a physical book like Brett did. Her book Yoga Life: Habits, Poses, and Breathwork To Channel Joy Amidst The Chaos releases in December 2023, and can be a great example of how to structure your ideas and concepts for a book.

Guide Potential Clients the Right Way

Do not go into marketing with the idea of chasing the dollar. You will begin to operate from a place of desperation. You are an expert, so trust that. Building your coaching business will take time. Be patient with yourself. All of that to say that if you hop on a free coaching call with someone, take it seriously. Treat them and coach them the same way you would a paying client. At the very least, they will be able to provide you a testimonial or feedback and also allow you to practice your own coaching techniques.

If your coaching call is to feel out whether or not you & the prospective client could possibly work together, but you know it will not, be honest & tell them that. You can simply say, “This has been a great coaching session, but I don’t feel that me coaching you is in alignment right now.” This is another reason that networking is important. It will be great for you personally & your life coaching business to have another coach you could refer people to if you don’t feel you can help them or do not vibe well with them.

Overall, be a coach with integrity. Come from a place of love, and always keep the clients’ best interest in mind regardless of what that means for you financially.

Use Client Reviews to Your Advantage

When your past & current clients have something positive to say about you, save it & post it. Save it because that is content that is evergreen. You can reuse it over & over again. These reviews are especially useful when you are launching a new product, or re-launching a product & the review is about the product you are re-launching. Having a constant stream of content for social proof is paramount. Your audience wants to know what others have thought about working with you, they want to know what kind of results you help people get, and they want to see that you have been successful in delivering what you are offering them.

Common Questions About Life Coach Marketing

There may still be some questions burning in your head, and I am hoping I can quickly answer some of them for you below.

Where can I advertise as a life coach?

You can advertise anywhere & everywhere you can. From being able to leave business cards at local businesses, sponsoring an event/sport/etc., collaborations to get in front of other people’s audiences, to paid advertising on social media platforms, billboards, websites, etc. The truth is, with advertising, there are no limits. Get creative. You can market anywhere & everywhere. I have personally even bought bulk inspirational bookmarks, printed up address labels with my contact information & who I coach. Then, I give them out, or leave them random places for people to find.

How do I sell myself as a life coach?

The best way to see yourself as business coach is by:

1. Being authentically you, there is only one you & even though you may do what other coaches out there do, people are choosing to invest their money in YOU. They like your message, how you deliver it, and the approach you take to get results.
2. Being supportive of your professional network, and prospective clients.
3. Showing up consistently to offer valuable content & education.
4. Being credible, you can attract clients & gain clients by proving yourself to be an expert in your area of life coaching.

To help motivate you & prepare for all of the abundance you are about to have as a result of your skills & credibility as a life coach, for the next 18 days, practice Brett’s 18 Days of Abundance

Is there a market for life coaches?

Absolutely. You can read more about this in How Much Does A Life Coach Make? But here is a small excerpt from that post that can best answer this question:

According to Grand View Research, being a new coach would not keep you from booking coaching sessions. The outlook for the demand for life coaches is on the up & up. There is a projection that life coaching is expected to have a compound annual growth rate of 4.85% from now until 2030.

Here is more good news, according to this same research listed above, it has been reported that many people that have used life coaches are both highly satisfied with & trust their coaches.

The International Coaching Federation also conducted a study that found that 22% of people who have never used a life coach in the past will likely use one in the future, and an astounding 43% of people have already used life coaching in the past.

How do you promote a life coaching business?

• collaborate & network
• build a strong social media presence
• show up consistently
• look into paid advertising
• write guest blog posts
• be a guest on a podcast where you can freely talk & discuss your life coaching business

There are truly no limits to how you can promote your life coaching business. The more creative your idea, the better because people will remember you & your creativity.

How can life coaches raise their profile to attract quality clients?

When people are looking for a coach, they are paying for the person who will be coaching. Nothing out there that is being coached is without competition. However, the way you present yourself, how you show up, and the way you deliver your message are what is attracting your ideal clients to YOU.

You can raise your profile by continuing to be you & engaging with your life coaching business your way. Try not to be so concerned about what you think people want to see & here. Rather, take aligned action.

Feel into what you intuitively want to post. Stay true to you & your message.

What are the tools needed for marketing for life coaches?

• an email marketing account using platforms such as:
• freebie offers such as masterclasses, mini courses, PDFs, templates, etc.
• social media profiles (no more than 2 if you are just starting out)
• a marketing strategy
• consistent branding
• a budget if you are going to be engaging in paid advertising

Conclusion

Overall marketing your life coaching business should be fun. This is what you do. You help others, and you are passionate about what you do. Develop a marketing plan that feels aligned, that you can do consistently, and that you find enjoyable. No two marketing plans are the same, and that is the beauty of marketing your life coaching business. You have the space to get creative, and you should always be looking for new ways to market yourself using those creative methods to help you stand out in your niche.

Make marketing fun for you, and you can’t go wrong ⭐️

Next Steps

• If you’re interested in learning the three skills that empower you to embody your yoga off the mat to get the results you desire in your personal life, check out my Yoga for Self Mastery course.
• Explore my knowledge hub for How to Become a Yoga Teacher or consider becoming a Somatic Yoga Coach in my newest certification program.
• Practice yoga with me on my YouTube channel with over a thousand free classes.